1. Field of the Invention
It is known to produce a decorative pattern on the surface of an object, such as a sheet of paper or the like, by floating one material on the surface of a liquid material and transferring the floated material to the object by contacting a surface of the object with the surface of the liquid material. Typical of the known processes is the floating of an oil based liquid on a water surface; the oil based liquid, being immiscible with the water surface, can stay in a pattern and be transferred in that pattern to an object brought into contact with the water surface. The reverse of that process is also known where water based materials are floated on an oil based surface. It is also known to produce patterns of different colors by using float materials that will not mix on the float surface and will then be transferable as separate colors in some pattern. Variations on these prior art methods are used in xerography and other duplicating processes.
A difficulty with the prior art methods for production methods and hobbycraft activities is the problem of treating spills of the liquid materials and the "clean up" after the coating processes have been completed. Water based materials can usually be passed to conventional drains but there is some difficulty in disposing of oil based materials and more difficulty is encountered in cleaning up spilled oil based materials. In the case of a child's hobbycraft, the use of oil based materials as the transfer material is likely to produce more clean up activity than the hobbycraft activity itself. A further difficulty with prior methods for hobbycraft activities is the mixing of complex formulas for liquid baths that sometimes require hours, and even days, of advanced preparations for the actual hobbycraft activity.